Should I expect my Canadian wireless to work in Tokyo?

[Slartibunkfest]

I remember from my time in Japan a few years back that wireless interoperability hadn't quite had all the kinks worked out, and that there were some problems using North-American equipment in Tokyo and vise-versa (including one case where it worked technically but wasn't allowed under regulations).

A colleague is heading from Canada to Japan in a couple of months. Should he expect his Canadian 802.11 card to work smoothly in Tokyo, or is he better off waiting to buy something there?

Thanks for any advice
Slart

[tumpy]

My smc 2532w-b can work in any country, and its pretty cheap $60 or less...

[Phoenix]

If it's an 802.11b card and it was built after January 1, 2002 it should be fine and all 802.11g cards. 802.11a (5GHz) cards probably will not.

[Mentera]

buy a Proxim Orinoco world gold card of any flavour b, b/g, a/b/g and it will work anywhere.

[Mr Lodin]

The 802.11b/g defines 14 channels in the 2.4 GHz frequency band. FCC regulations allow use of channel 1-11 in the US. ETSI (Europe) allows channels 1-13 but MKK (Japan) only allow channel 14 to be used.
The WLAN circuits are usually designed to operate at any of the 14 channels but drivers prevent use of channels not allowed in your particular region.
Make sure that channel 14 can be set on your card or that drivers for your equipment can be down loaded supporting other regions.

[danielmaui]

OK... where is the "Japan only supports one channel... channel 14" coming from? If someone can point me to this definitive statement, I'd appreciate it.

Meanwhile, I'll believe Cisco and Apple that channels 1-14 are available for use in Japan (except 14 not for 802.11g):

LONG URL WARNING:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/wireless/ps4555/
products_administration_guide_chapter09186a00801ee 6a5.html#1021825

Apple: http://www.apple.com/airportextreme/specs.html

Have a good one!;)

[Mr Lodin]

Wow! This was news to me.

But after looking into it, I think I've managed to figure out the source of our disagreement.
The original specification for the IEEE 802.11 standard stated that only channel 14 was allowed for use in Japan (p.216). The first amendment for 802.11b (DSSS with CCK for 5.5 and 11 Mbps) didn't state anything different.
However, in October 2001 there was a second amendment to 802.11b that extended the operating range in Japan to include channels 1-13.
This should explain why cards build after this date (or January 2002) should work fine in Japan as well.

Sorry about any confusion...

[ladia]

I've been in the US just for summer and 've been thinking of buying Linksys wireless router WRT54g. I was wondering if it's just a firmware I have to upload to the router and that's it. The power supply is not a problem.
Does anybody have an experience. The router is much cheaper than at home in Czech Republic. Thanks.

[Mr Lodin]

Europe is not a problem.
As long as the equipment is Wi-Fi certified it will work with other Wi-Fi certified equipment. Drivers from US should enable operation in channel 1-11. In Europe these channels (along with channel 12 and 13) are allowed according to regulations. You might need new software to use all 13 channels but it probably won't be an issue especially as it isn't client hardware.